Excerpts From The Text And Photographs of Drylands: The Deserts of North America by Philip Hyde, Part Three

Capitol Reef from Cohab Canyon, Capitol Reef National Park, Utah, 1978, by Philip Hyde. Nationally exhibited and first published in “Drylands: The Deserts of North America” by Philip Hyde. A stronger, more majestic photograph than a similar earlier image published in “Slickrock: The Canyon Country of Southeast Utah” with Edward Abbey.

Drylands: The Deserts of North America with photographs and text by Philip Hyde, developed out of nearly 60 years of exploring and defending western North American wilderness, with special emphasis on the five deserts of the continent. Yolla Bolly Press, which also packaged Mountain Light by Galen Rowell and other foundational landscape photography titles, recently donated its archive to Stanford University, where Drylands and its production can be viewed. Drylands is now out of print, but can be found at various online booksellers including Amazon under Drylands: The Deserts of North America by Philip Hyde.

Passing through vast expanses of land that appear to be nearly bereft of any living thing, I wonder at the sight of a small plant braving the harsh environment. Its difficult circumstances do not evoke sympathy; I wonder that the plant grows in spite of difficulties, that it conserves what little moisture it gets and responds to the slightest moisture by blooming exuberantly.

Still another delight feeds the photographer within: the light. Desert light is crystalline and brilliant, making deep shadows and sparkling highlights. This is at least partly a result of the scarcity of moisture in the air—and, until recently, the scarcity of humans and their activities. When there were fewer people, the light everywhere must have had the clear quality that is still to be seen in some of the more remote quarters of the North American deserts.

As a mountain lover, I especially appreciate a characteristic that our deserts share with most of the country from the Rockies west: the deserts of North America are uncommonly mountainous. The two snowiest mountain chains in the country, the Sierra Nevada and the Cascades border the northernmost deserts on the windward sides. Scattered throughout all of the deserts are a large number of lesser mountain ranges that cast their own rain shadows on the adjacent areas. Some of these lesser ranges are high enough and wet enough to support forests on their upper slopes. Rising high above the parched plains and valleys below, they may be snow capped in winter, like the higher ones to the west. The White Mountains, Toiyabe, Snake, Ruby, and other ranges in Nevada, along with the high plateaus of Utah and Arizona and the Sierra Madre in Mexico, create their own microclimates: islands of plenty surrounded by desert.

Nowhere in the world is there as much diversity of desert weather as there is in western North America. In western Oregon, California, and Nevada precipitation occurs mostly in winter, in summer only rarely. In the eastern and southern parts of the Mexican deserts, summer is the rainy season. Where rainfall records are available for desert locations, they show radical irregularity. Downpours may occur at random intervals and locations, sometimes exceeding the year’s average in a few minutes or hours. In some places droughts can last several years, with no rainfall at all. The North American deserts are second to none for intensity of summer heat, but the dryness of the air makes the heat more bearable. Death Valley can be as hot on a summer day as any place on earth, while at higher elevations a sweater may be necessary when the sun sets and the air cools.

The great diversity of the vast desert landscape of North America suggests natural divisions that coincide with most scientific classifications. But the actual boundaries of these divisions are not so easy to draw within those of the larger desert region. In most cases, one desert shades into another, so boundaries must be somewhat arbitrary and indefinite, as are all attempts by humans to circumscribe nature. As I write this I think of Sir Francis Bacon saying: “Nature is a labyrinth in which the very haste you move with may make you lose your way.”

Continued in the blog post, “Drylands: The Deserts of North America 4.”

Conservation Photographer Philip Hyde And Naturalist Ardis Hyde Look Deeply Into Proposed Wilderness And A Possible National Park In The North Cascade Mountains Of Washington And The Oregon Cascades…

In July 1959, Ardis and Philip Hyde drove their Covered Wagon pickup leisurely through Oregon and Washington past Seattle into the North Cascades Mountain Range…

Cascade Pass was closed, but Steven’s Pass proved nearly as direct to Lake Chelan. After arrival at Lake Chelan, Ardis and Philip woke up about 5:00 am on July 9 to arrange their gear and catch the Lady of the Lake, a small passenger liner ship, which would take them 55 miles from Chelan at the lower end of Lake Chelan to Stehekin at the upper end of the lake.

In Stehekin they ate a “delicious lunch in a coffee shop and met Phil Berry, Sierra Club Pack Trip leader.” The pack trip into the North Cascades started up the Park Creek trail by around 3:30 pm. Participants in the pack trip included David Brower and his sons Bob Brower and Ken Brower, as well as Kathleen Revis from National Geographic. Spring was just reaching the high country and the trail of nearly six miles was all in the shade in the late afternoon. The hike was “frigid,” Ardis Hyde wrote in the travel log.

The group spent a week exploring the best scenery of the North Cascades including Huge mountain faces, glaciers rising thousands of feet out of green forests, tumbling mountain streams and meadows. “Progress was slowed by frequent picture stops,” Ardis Hyde wrote. “Highlights of the trip were the new spring chartreuse needles on the larch trees and the magnificent views across Park Creek to the Peaks: Mt. Agnes, Mt. Spider, Mt. Dome, Chickamon Glacier and a glimpse of Glacier Peak. Each of these unveiled themselves in succession from behind a veil of clouds that gradually all disappeared. By afternoon the sky was clear.”

On another day of the trip they had more than a glimpse of Glacier Peak as they climbed to Image Lake and looked across the deep glaciated valley for a dazzling view of the huge mountain. When they returned on foot to Stehekin they took a plane ride to view from the air some of the country they had hiked. They visited Sierra Club leader Grant Mc Connell’s famous homestead cabin, as well as Hugh Courtney’s perhaps more locally famous homestead cabin that had been built in 1906. Hugh Courtney had arrived in 1917 and added onto the cabin.

Saturday, July 18, 1959: We stopped at Hugh Courtney’s Cabin to take a picture of it in morning light. He showed us old photos of Lake Chelan and the town of Stehekin with lake boats in the early 1900s. We drove the Avery truck into Stehekin and talked at length to Harry Buckner about park and development proposals for the area. We boarded Lady of the Lake and arrived at the far other end of the long, narrow Lake Chelan. The heat on the lake from here to Wenatchee was disagreeable, but we spent the night in an air-conditioned motel.

Sunday, July 19, 1959: During the morning until 11:00 we worked on reorganization, laundry and re-loading film. The drive from Wenatchee to Timberline Lodge was scorching hot all the way. Crossed the Columbia River at the Hood River Bridge. It was 107 degrees Fahrenheit in Hood River. We reached 6,000 feet in elevation around 7:15 pm on the slopes of Mt. Hood, where we had a good view of Mt. Jefferson. Bear Grass was in bloom. After dinner in the lodge we spent the night in our pickup parked on the dirt road leading into the timberline trees just below the lodge. It looked light like a forest fire was burning to the South.

Monday, July 20, 1959: In our pickup we headed past Olallie Lake to Breitenbush Lake where we made a base for tomorrow’s backpack into Jefferson Park. Breitenbush Lake is especially beautiful, shallow with grassy irregularities in the shallows, bordered with bear grass at one end under a mountain peak. Breitenbush Lake is set in a large, open meadow with an almost groomed park like appearance under the full moon.

Tuesday, July 21: Off for a six-mile hike into Jefferson Park. It started out as an easy climb, but the trail traversed much snow near the top of the ridge overlooking Jefferson Park. Deep red paintbrush grew in patches and the pink and white heather were abundant. An impressive number of small lakes and puddles of snow water are forming near the top of the ridge. The entire area was inviting and lovely as mounds of snow melted into the forming water depressions. We made a long, one-mile descent into Jefferson Park, which was filled with snowmelt depressions all over, with one large lake. Dirty campsites had marred the water. So we picked an open place on the heather for sleeping bag sites. We made our own fireplace on a patch of dirt near the trail and took water from a pothole. Mosquitoes were so abundant we could never relax. We were grateful we had brought netting, which we mounted over our heads during the night. Our campsite was in full view of Mt. Jefferson, which rose in the North and towered over us.

Wednesday, July 22: Up at 5 am to get an early start for it is a hot day and night on the trail at 6:30 pm going straight up ridge rather than by trail traversing the slope. We lingered on the other side of the ridge for more pictures of lively snow melt pockets. In retrospect these little water gems were the prettiest art we saw. We had the whole park to ourselves until on the way out we met a party going in. On the way out we also encountered a group of botanists from Oregon State. We reached Breitenbush Lake about 11 am. Last part of the trail was very hot over sunny open spaces. We packed up and left in the afternoon coming out to the Santiam Highway and then going onto a dirt road again at Clear Lake. We stopped at Sahale Falls for a look, but the light was gone. Went on to Koosah Falls. Decided to camp at Koosah Falls and get both falls in morning light. Across the road was well-framed ice cap springs. Clouds were forming too.

Thursday, July 23: Overcast and some sprinkles of rain. Philip photographed both falls, especially lovely in their red cedar dense and lush forest setting….

Recreational development is a job not of building roads into lovely country, but of building receptivity into the still unlovely human mind. – Aldo Leopold

Many people today would rather not discuss environmental issues. The environment is a subject that reminds people of thoughts and emotions they are often trying to forget. Bringing up such topics, some consider as taboo and as deadly to conversation as discussing politics or religion.

Along the same lines, when people are faced with, and allow to sink in a bit, some of the scientifically established facts of climate change, they respond with a wide range emotions: denial, rage, fear, grieving, indifference, resignation and others. If we do discuss climate change, it is with a dispassionate distance, as though it is not a matter of survival, of the life and death of our species, but something mildly in need of our intellectual attention and problem solving abilities, like an algebra equation. Some believe that an excessively hot planet with temperatures continuing to rise is something we can learn to live with. Meanwhile, many of the most credible sources say that just slight changes will bring about ongoing natural catastrophe, which in turn will readily destroy our economic system and our way of life.

Much of this can be debated indefinitely and is, but my intent in mentioning it here to begin with is to emphasize that these are serious, grown up problems that must be reckoned with, not forgotten about or avoided indefinitely. Each of us must start now to act in ways that have less environmental impact. We have to take responsibility and make changes ourselves, individually, regardless of what the US Congress, our president, or other world governments and corporations do. Regularly I see political slogans that say we need to keep Big Oil from causing climate change. True, we do need to stop subsidizing Big Oil, but we also need to remember they are in the business and we are all their customers. If we do not believe in their product, we need to gradually decrease our use of it, in all of its forms.

Climate Change through the refinement and distribution of fossil fuels is what Big Oil does for a living. It is what they have done for a living for a long time. Yet we must remember that it is the actual burning of the fossil fuels that is changing the climate. We are doing the burning. Meanwhile, we are asking them to change businesses, when we ourselves will not even change jobs to use less gasoline, or to do work that itself is more earth friendly. We will not change homes, change cars, or change other products we buy and use, yet we ask Big Oil to change the core of its livelihood. The picture will not change until we change. Major seed changes have almost always come from the people, from the bottom up, not from the top down. Top down management has brought us the world we have now, which is a calamitous train wreck about to happen. It would be easier to get off the train if it were moving more slowly, but as the train continues to gain momentum, we will begin to realize that jumping from the train is a better option than staying aboard. As a whole, the civilized world has doubled its energy use since 1980. This is a monumental trend in the wrong direction.

Most of it stems from short-term thinking, our own, as a people, and that of our leaders. The primary business of politicians on both the left and right is to kick the can down the road. As I listen to NPR or Democracy Now, I hear on a regular basis, politicians from California, or from the US, or from other countries, in the process of passing laws that set standards to be reached by a certain future year, usually 10 or 20 years from now. What is to stop the next batch of politicians in office from kicking the can farther down the road? Nothing. Which is why this kind of do-nothing, but appear-to-be-doing-something politics continues. We as a people rarely stop and say, “Hey, wait a minute, that law is not real. It is just a dog and pony show for the Television evening news.”

Examples of short-term thinking are abundant. When it comes to art, people would rather fill their homes with lots of cheap junk that will wind up in a landfill, than save and gather their resources to acquire a few quality pieces of artwork with provenance that will last and go up in value as a real asset to be sold at a profit or passed on to heirs. We have this same Walmart mentality about many items. We would rather buy a cheaper bike for $250 and have to buy a whole new one every four or five years, than save up and spend $800-$1000 on a bike that will last the rest of our lives. Even the $800 bike will no longer last a lifetime because planned obsolescence and lack of durability are built into the manufacturing system. Cheap is what people want, or is it?

Much of this comes down to education and how people are raised. Some parents teach their children to be racists, to hate people of other religions, or conversely, to be tolerant of all religions, to have empathy and appreciation for the diversity of cultures and myriad ways of living and worshipping on this planet. Some children rebel against whatever they are taught anyway, but Culture, environmental awareness, tolerance, open-mindedness or lack thereof are all teachings or programming, as are values, art, ethics and religion, which is man made. It’s all the same God, but some people try to claim that they have a different God, or that if you approach God any other way than by their approach, you are doomed and damned. I can see why some people don’t believe in God at all. Many others object to using the term, “God.” I certainly don’t believe in an angry, vengeful, insecure, spiteful God, the God forced down throats by Puritans and other fundamentalist extremists.

The early environmentalists and naturalists, sometimes called transcendentalists, such as Henry David Thoreau, Walt Whitman, Ralph Waldo Emerson and others from the 1800s, believed God was in nature. This is also what Saint Francis of Assisi taught much earlier in the 13th Century. There is much debate as to when environmentalism started, though it could be argued that St. Francis was the first environmentalist. Moving forward into the 19th and 20th Century, one of John Muir’s main purposes for getting out into nature as often as possible, much like St. Francis, was to get closer to God and through immersion in the “works” of God, to have a spiritual, transcendent experience. A belief in God is not required to live a good life, but we must be careful of Godlessness and a lack of responsibility based on lack of faith in anything. Lack of faith in anything often blocks transcendent experience, which is part of what maintains our belief in existence and meaning in it. A belief in karma, what comes around goes around, or religious morality, even the threat of punishment has helped guide people toward fulfilling, thoughtful, sensitive and generous lives. It has kept people from living without regard for fellows or surroundings. When Friedrich Nietzsche said God is dead in the 1800s and people began to give up religion en masse, they no longer had an ethical basis for decisions or actions. People did not espouse any concept of consequences like the karmic law of cause and effect, which western civilization found in the East during that same time, but did not widely accept until much later. With religions often operating at the extremes and religious leaders acting in materialistic or perverted hypocritical ways, outdoor organizations, in many cases, actually now serve the purpose of educating people about God, Goddess, Great Spirit, Allah, Yahweh, All That Is, whatever you want to call It.

John Muir founded the Sierra Club in 1892. The Sierra Club’s primary purpose was to educate people about how to live and take recreation in harmony with nature. The Sierra Club initiated the idea of national forest preserves that became our national forests. The early Sierra Club defended and helped maintain the sanctity of our national parks. In the 1960s and 1970s, the Sierra Club, Wilderness Society, Boy Scouts of America and other groups began to talk about the concept of minimal impact that later became Leave No Trace, which is a sort of environmental Golden Rule, or outdoor law of karma. The US Forest Service, Bureau of Land Management and National Park Service cooperatively produced a pamphlet in 1987 titled, “Leave No Trace Land Ethics.” In 1990, the Forest Service in conjunction with the National Outdoor Leadership School established a national education program of Leave No Trace, to work with the Forest Service instructions for motorized recreation called Tread Lightly. Low impact education is now offered through the Leave No Trace non-profit group and many other organizations all over the world.

The basic summary of Leave No Trace is formalized into seven principles:

The Leave No Trace principles could even be extrapolated into a business philosophy, a way to create true sustainability on earth. If we could operate industries such as mining and logging using long-term Leave No Trace principles, this would accomplish sustainability, in fact, not just in name. Most sustainability advocates are working too gradually, offering proposals that make industry just slightly greener in baby steps, rather than rethinking from the ground up. Again, just like the issues with Big Oil, and in our own private lives, these changes are often easier said than made, but we need to step up the pace, if the changes are to do any good, or stave off the destruction that is already under way.

More on Leave No Trace, how children and grownups learn ethics, or not, and how to live responsibly, in future blog posts in this series…

Part Three: Down To The Green River And Up To Ely Falls

Into Jones Hole

As we ambled down the trail away from the Diamond Mountain Fish Hatchery and into Jones Hole, we began to see signs of what Randy Fullbright and the Park Ranger had been talking about: the recent rock slide. High on the cliff we could see the fresh, unstained light tan undercut where giant sandstone boulders, just weeks before, had peeled away from the cliff and come tumbling nearly straight down at least 1,500 feet, landing like bombs in Jones Creek and rolling through the forest smashing trees and everything else in their path.

The Boulders ranged from small house size down to bowling balls and had badly broken up the deciduous forest and riparian undergrowth on both sides of Jones Creek. Jones Creek contained many of the light tan boulders, as did the entire surrounding area in about half a mile radius of the main devastated area. It must have been quite a sight to observe all that sandstone raining down from high on the cliff above–and the noise must have been deafening. The trail had been closed for weeks as the Park Service was still nervous about allowing anyone to hike into Jones Hole. They were afraid more sandstone would come tumbling down and crush unknowing hikers and fishermen. Park Rangers had re-routed the trail to skirt safely around what looked much like a war zone. Randy and I walked into the heart of the devastated area and approached the creek to see the damage. After observing the current effects of geology in action and making a few documentary snapshots, we moved back to the detoured trail and on down the canyon.

Fishing, Hiking And Photographing

Jones Hole attracts fishermen from all over that part of Utah and Colorado. The Park Service still plants Jones Creek with Rainbow Trout from the Fish Hatchery upstream. While Jones Hole generally appeared dry and desert like, cottonwood trees, willows, tamarisk and other riparian plants grew thickly along Jones Creek. Besides, on that day at times it felt like rain could overtake us any minute as the sky brooded overhead. Other times the ceiling thinned and the sun grew brighter trying to break through. The light greens of sage and sagebrush offset by the deeper greens of the larger trees along the creek, with dried yellows and beiges of meadow grasses provided a good mixed palette of colors and textures against the reds, browns and tans of the sandstone cliffs behind.

We mainly hiked, but stopped for photographs occasionally. Randy made only a few photographs the entire day, while I stopped more frequently and he waited in his courteous, quiet way. Photographing Jones Hole took some adjustment as I am used to the lush river canyons of the Northern Sierra in California, or the more complete desert scenes of other parts of Utah further south. Much of the views of Jones Creek were a wild tangle, but the creek itself had character, as did the cliffs all around, if we looked closely. Randy took me on a detour off the trail and over to the cliff across the creek at one point to show me the petroglyphs and pictographs he had promised. These were not large or overly striking, but they were impressive in how well preserved and distinctly they stood out in red-brown against the tan cliffs at that spot. Few people know where they are and Randy said he and the Park Rangers intend to keep it that way.

Back on the main trail, we stopped for lunch along the creek where there were a couple of giant 10X20 foot natural granite “tables” and a good spot for photographs up and down the creek. It was good to sit in the shade or what was trying to be sunshine, stop and breath in the warm desert air with the more fecund smell of mud and life along the water. After a good break from hiking and a dunk of our shirts in the stream, refreshed we set off again. Except for a few sections moving over boulders along Jones Creek, most of the trail was fairly smooth, though a bit sandy in places. The hike still felt fairly strenuous to me at four miles each way, down to the Green River and back to the Fish Hatchery. Across and high on the canyon wall, Randy pointed out where a spring came out of the rock and made a waterfall and place to “shower” and get refreshed high above the trail. Though the spring was only a trickle at that time, we could see a thin silver ribbon of falling water high up against the far cliff.

Dinosaur’s Main Character–The Green River And Its Canyons–Now And Then

Not long after, we emerged from the trees to find ourselves finally at the Green River. Almost immediately after we walked out on the gravel shore, a herd of bighorn sheep passed us. Randy told me some stories of the males being less than friendly in rutting season, but this day the herd passed close by us without much concern. We looked around behind us at a tall, cone shaped promontory towering above Jones Creek. When we got out in the open and could see upstream, we noticed a rafting party beached on a rock and gravel spit above the riffle at the mouth of Jones Creek. Way up the Green River past the rafting party we could make out the outlines of the rock outcropping called Harper’s Corner that I had driven to in 2005 from the Colorado entrance to Dinosaur National Monument. My father, pioneer landscape photographer Philip Hyde, made a black and white photograph, published in 1955 in the National Geographic, from Harper’s Corner looking down over 3,000 feet at the upturned strata typical of the Green River and Yampa River canyons. Harper’s Corner also overlooks Echo Park and Steamboat Rock farther upstream, the proposed site of one of the dams slated for Dinosaur that Dad’s photographs helped prevent. Dad was the first photographer ever sent on assignment for an environmental cause to Dinosaur in 1951 to help prevent two proposed dams that would have flooded 96 out of 104 river miles in the monument. Dad’s photographs and those by river guide and journalist Marin Litton became the illustrations for the first book ever published for an environmental cause, This Is Dinosaur: Echo Park Country and Its Magic Rivers, edited and with introduction by Wallace Stegner.

The sky had been darkening most of the day and here at the Green River, it finally began to rain lightly. Our shirts we had soaked just an hour earlier were already dried out and the cooling rain felt rejuvenating, even though it passed after only about 15 minutes and everything dried out again quickly. Having worked for the last two months moving furniture and packing boxes at my townhouse in Boulder, Colorado, and having minimal sleep for a number of days, I was already tired, but because this was one chance that might not come again for years, if ever, I agreed to hike with Randy up Ely Canyon to Ely Falls on the way back to the Fish Hatchery.

Ely Canyon was interesting and narrower than the Jones Hole canyon. There were a lot of small dead Juniper tree skeletons dotting the landscape. Ely Creek and Ely Falls were both small, Ely Falls only being about 12 feet high, while the creek was only a foot or two wide in most of its course. However, the falls were set in a greenery-surrounded oasis. Randy and I talked about conservation and my father’s work in the area, as well as the present day prospects of Dinosaur National Monument becoming a national park. More on Ely Creek, Ely Creek Canyon and the movement to form a national park in the next blog post.

(Continued in the blog post, “Dinosaur National Monument, 2013, Part Four.”)

Have you ever been to Dinosaur National Monument? Have you seen bighorn sheep or any other large wild animal up close?

No other known set exists of complete student lecture notes from the first ten years of the California School of Fine Arts, now the San Francisco Art Institute. During the “Golden Decade,” directly after World War II, while Minor White was lead instructor, beginning in the Summer Session 1947, Philip Hyde took detailed class notes. These notes are what make up the core of a good number of entries in this series of blog articles on the history of the San Francisco Art Institute’s photography department.

Background And Founding Of The World’s First Professional Creative Photography Training

Minor White and Philip Hyde both attended their first Ansel Adams lecture on the same day at the start of the California School of Fine Arts Summer Session 1946. Ansel Adams brought in Minor White with the idea he would take Ansel Adams’ place as lead instructor. Minor White came directly from Columbia University on Beaumont and Nancy Newhall’s recommendation. In the 1946 Summer Session Minor White quickly proved himself as a coach of the young students and as a guest lecturer. Within a few weeks Ansel Adams felt confident enough in Minor White’s teaching abilities to leave him in charge of the class and set out on the road to photograph the national parks for his recently awarded Guggenheim Fellowship.

That Fall, Minor White also led the first class of full-time students in the world’s first academic full-time creative photography program. By Fall of 1947, a new crop of first year students began learning from Minor White at the California School of Fine Arts, renamed the San Francisco Art Institute in 1961. The San Francisco Art Institute still has one of the world’s most innovative photography departments, but the first ten years of the program, now called the Golden Decade, are the stuff of legend with guest lectures arranged by Minor White that included such photographic luminaries as Imogen Cunningham, Lissette Model, Dorothea Lange, and many others; as well as the highlight of each semester: a field trip to Wildcat Hill in Carmel to visit Edward Weston, complete with a field walk with him out on Point Lobos State Natural Reserve.

Ansel Adams first taught the photography Summer Session in 1945. Minor White joined him teaching in 1946. Philip Hyde started as a student at the same time, but due to an office paperwork error, did not make the list to attend the first full-time class in Fall 1946, but began photography school in the second full-time class in Fall 1947. The Summer Session 1947 featured lectures by both Adams and White. Philip Hyde’s lecture notes begin in the Summer Session 1947. Philip Hyde proved to be one of the most eager students, despite his full personal life.

On June 29, 1947, Philip Hyde married Ardis King in Berkeley. Ardis King’s family was from Sacramento, but her parents owned a house in Berkeley, where she and her brother Clint King lived while attending the University of California Berkeley. Philip and Ardis got to know each other while attending classes at UC Berkeley, where Ardis earned her teaching credential. They took a number of classes together, including a course in Calligraphy and Japanese Painting by the famous Japanese-American artist Chiura Obata. More on these classes and their influence on the Hydes in future blog posts.

Reciprocity Failure Defined

Following Minor White’s lecture on The Technical Aspects of Visualization on August 19, 1947, Ansel Adams came before the class and held forth on Reciprocity Failure for the next two days. Most of the lecture contents were too technical to reproduce here, with many graphs depicting film densities and sensitometry readings.

Reciprocity failure oversimplified, results in the failure of film to show accurate and unflawed detail in shadows. While the subject may seem dry in some ways, it is an important concept in straight photography where the values of clarity, sharpness and clean rendering without artifacts and film noise are considered of utmost importance. Many photographers today in the digital age don’t care about the technical aspects of photography because they don’t need to in order to produce high fidelity photography. Camera technology today, if used according to the manual and a few simple rules and guidelines, does much of the work automatically, when the correct settings are chosen. However, with large format film cameras, everything had to be done manually. Ansel Adams was a stickler for all technical aspects of photography and developing a solid base of knowledge and aptitude in his students. The results speak for themselves, evident in his negatives and black and white prints, as well as the negatives and fine art prints of his students. It is precisely because of their perfection that Ansel Adams prints are some of the most sought after by collectors and considered some of the most valuable in the history of the medium.

Whether you’re using a lower speed film in daylight, trying to maximize your depth of field in a landscape, or just setting up the camera for an exposure at night, sooner or later you’re going to start pushing the limits of your film’s light gathering ability. As light becomes more scarce, the silver halide grains residing in your film will be less uniformly struck by photons, causing a steep drop in density after a few seconds of needed exposure. This exponentially diminishing response to low light levels is more popularly known as a film’s reciprocity failure.

The Film Photography Project goes on to give examples of how different films exhibit reciprocity failure. For example, with black and white film, exposures of one or two seconds or longer will result in reduced density, that is, thin or non-existent shadow detail. With color negative film, exposures over 20 seconds cause color-shifting as different color dye layers in the film absorb light at different rates during prolonged exposure. With color slide film, exposures over five seconds result in color shifts similar to color negative film, while high color saturation slide films such as Fuji Velvia color shift to an even greater degree than lower color density films.

Ansel Adams’ two-day lecture on reciprocity failure gave his students the tools to avoid reciprocity failure. Some of the technical terms and information implies previous knowledge from earlier lectures of various photographic subjects such as the Zone System. Stay tuned for a simple explanation of the Zone System in future posts in this series. These notes are presented primarily for the historical record.

Philip Hyde’s Lecture Notes, August 19, 1947

Reciprocity failure—inertia of film in low intensity light—film doesn’t respond to slight illumination.

Visualization and light metering—Use a long tube for the light meter to explore light readings of distant objects.

A Wratten 90 filter (tan color) for viewing—neutralizes color

Example: Greens on Kodak Verichrome Pan film drop nearly a full zone in value due to lack of green sensitivity.

All measurements for density should be above film base plus fog.

[Film base plus fog refers to the inherent density of any film before exposure. It consists of the film base plus any fog that has accumulated on the film due to subtle light exposure in handling]

For the sake of measurement and calculations, film base plus fog should not be less than 0.1 in density.

Pre-Exposure Exercise

Expose a white card for Zone II or Zone I depending on amount of exposure added. Then expose the scene normally. The units added will equal the numeric relation between zones. That is:

My impressions from this lecture and other sources, as well as my own experiences, leads me to believe that it was complicated to make good photographs with large format film cameras. When photographers take for granted how easy photography is now, I often think of my father, Philip Hyde’s notes and his early training with Ansel Adams. What are your thoughts?

Art, Earth And Ethics, Part One

National Forests, Spotted Owls, Environmentalism, The Abuse Of Nature And Our Future

The Earth will survive, but will man survive on the Earth? – Philip Hyde

Secret Cove, Ponderosa Pine Trees, Lake Tahoe, Sierra Nevada of California in the distance, copyright 2014 David Leland Hyde. New Addition to David Leland Hyde’s Sierra Portfolio. The water quality that gives Lake Tahoe its natural clarity and azure blue color were declining until environmental reforms in the Tahoe Basin turned the situation around. Lake Tahoe is clearer today than it was five years ago.

My father, American landscape photographer Philip Hyde, and my mother Ardis bought 18 acres in 1956 for a few thousands dollars in Plumas County in the Northern Sierra Nevada of California. Plumas National Forest borders this land where I grew up, on two sides. Plumas National Forest also happens to be the top lumber producing national forest in the Lower 48 United States.

While my father was an artist and my mother a schoolteacher, my childhood friends were sons and daughters of loggers in Plumas National Forest and farmers in nearby Indian Valley. I remember conversations on both sides of the environmental equation. A good example of the nature of these discussions occurred recently. It was more of a one-sided rant than a dialog. A retired logger, who I consider a friend, and one of his friends, a claim gold miner, were raving about “those damn enviro’s.” Their comments were vaguely directed toward me, though also more general, offered in protest of all the injustices in the world and their own lives.

“I can’t believe the Feather River Land Trust won’t let us hunt ducks on the Heart K Ranch in Genesee Valley any more. We’ve been hunting ducks there for 50 years. Rich city people come up here and they don’t know anything about our way of life.” They were on a roll, fueled by beer and who knows what else. I did not intervene at first.

“There are no jobs left because of the enviro’s,” One of them said. “Yeah, and the damn Spotted Owl,” the other said. “Just because of one tiny bird, whole forests are closed to logging. What’s more important: one stupid little bird, or the economy? I’d like to take every one of those damn Spotted Owls and strangle them. People are the endangered species.”

I started to respond, but the old logger interrupted me, “We know what you’re going to say. You’re in cahoots with the wealthy Bay Area crowd. Don’t talk any of that rubbish in this house. I’ll throw you out.”

I rode my bike home and pondered how the above conversation has not changed for 50 or even hundreds of years either. What these hard working old guys fail to understand is that the Spotted Owl is only a symptom, just the tip of a very large iceberg. The ecosystems are breaking down and these few species that are dying are like advance warnings. Depending on your perspective, a few bees are not so important. “We can just get beehives to pollinate the crops,” another local said. Neither is it vital whether the local frogs can still reproduce, or whether any other single species, or single population of a species lives or dies. However, when you stop and think about how many human fertility clinics there were 30 years ago and how many there are now in every town, when you start to connect the dots, you begin to get the bigger picture.

The Earth is a web of all life. Everything is connected to everything else. You destroy one part of the web of life and you eventually destroy yourself. People reading this blog perhaps will say this is a “no-brainer,” that I’m not pointing out anything new here. True, but why are we as a collective not getting it? Not doing enough to change our perspective and our ways? Greed? Corruption? Selfishness? Lack of vision? Denial? Laziness? Pessimism? Resignation? What is your excuse for still driving a traditional car? …For burning fossil fuel? …For using plastic products? …For not recycling? Even hybrid and electric automobiles have a tremendous impact on the environment just through their manufacture and the mining extraction of the materials that go into them.

Is it really the environment that we need to save, or ourselves? When we act in ways that have less impact, carpool, ride a bike, is it truly on behalf of the environment? Is that the primary concern? Or is environmentalism really self-preservation? My father used to say that we do not need to worry about the Earth. It will be here long after we are gone. It is our own survival for which we need to be concerned. Therefore, are environmentalists in reality interested in protecting the environment at the expense of people, or precisely because it is our own future that is in jeopardy.

This paradox still escapes the majority of people in our culture. What do we do about it? I was lucky to grow up with both an environmental ethic and an art aesthetic. Care for the planet and beauty as a telltale of balanced health are ingrained in my psyche. Unfortunately, most people do not grow up as fortunately. To put in perspective how blindly oblivious and unaware some can be, take for instance one extreme case: this video of former Boy Scout leaders destroying an ancient rock formation in Goblin Valley State Park in Utah.

When I first saw this video of young men responsible for leading others into nature having no respect for nature, I was dismayed, not only about those committing the crime and their kind, but also about whether there is any hope for our civilization. What we fail to realize is that we are all taking actions much like these ignorant young men. Not only are there just enough clueless people like them running around that it is easy to fall into thinking we are doomed, but we are all clueless to a much greater degree than we understand. In the realm of photography, even many nature and landscape photographers seem to have no respect for nature or other photographers, as landscape photographer Sarah Marino reported in her photoblog post, in which she suggested a field etiquette for landscape photographers.

Regardless of misguided deeds and a destructive approach to nature by our whole civilization, I believe there is still hope. I am writing this new series of blog posts precisely because I believe there is something we may not yet know, something we have not yet discovered, some new information or new action that will save us. This does not mean we can sit back, relax, watch TV, play video games, surf Facebook and not worry. It means that we need to put all of our synergistic efforts and pooled resources into finding a solution. But are we likely to do that? That is the question.

A New Yorker article, Scientific American and Grist Magazine report that even many leading scientists believe it is already too late to do anything about Climate Change. Wow, that went fast. Many people still doubt and wonder whether it is reality or myth, truth or fiction. Those of us who have been reading the science know that it is based on much more than mere computer modeling. We know that the science of Global Warming is based on mountains of hard evidence and real measurements that are hard to misread.

The abuse of nature has gone on for thousands of years. It is even sanctioned in the Bible. Genesis says our role is to conquer and have dominion over the Earth. Fortunately, today large numbers of Christians are not taking the Bible literally. More moderate Christians are in favor of applying the passages in the good book that tout taking care of Earth.

In the recent winner of the Colorado Book Award, Dam Nation: How Water Shaped the West and Will Determine Its Future, author Stephen Grace covers the devastating state of water and drought in the Western US today. Water laws, originally developed in the much wetter East, protect the use of water channeled away from rivers and streams at the expense of in-stream ecological, aesthetic and recreational values.

As economies across the West surged, streams were dammed, ditched, and diverted until their beds were nearly bare. Many rivers became toxic trickles because they didn’t carry enough volume to dilute poisons and flush themselves clean. And each diversion for an offstream use, whether to grow crops, make steel or send drinking water to city taps, reduced the amount of instream flow available for supporting fish and wildlife populations, nourishing riparian vegetation, and promoting recreational pursuits such as boating, camping, fishing, and bird watching… To some, especially those profiting from raising beef on irrigated pasture—these uses seemed ridiculous at best, a threat to their way of life at worst.

Hoover Dam on the Colorado River helped supply the power to win World War II. After the War Hoover Dam was one of the underpinnings of the US rise to world power. Damming and diverting rivers has become as American as apple pie and as loved as baseball in the political arena, but the effects on watersheds, the durability of our limited fresh water supply and ultimately the health of the arteries of life on Earth is at stake.

On a larger scale, we are treating nature with the same abusive disdain across the globe. Are we lacking ethics or taste? Is it simply in our nature to be a parasite on the face of the Earth? Can we change? These and other questions, answers and ways out of the trap we have set for ourselves will be the subject of this new blog series.

The Essential Guide To Photographing Arches National Park

Bret Edge is what I would call a power landscape photographer. His compositions are direct, with strong lines and bold arrangements that may often portray iconic scenery, but with more ingenuity and interest than most. The graphic design and lettering of Edge’s new guide to photographing Arches National Park are big and bold and frame his power images and direct text perfectly. In addition, NatureScapes’ logo and motif indicate that this new, bright and crisp PDF is one of their Photography Series eBooks and can be ordered directly from NatureScapes’ order page.

Besides small sections about the author, NatureScapes and a general introduction to the national park, the table of contents is divided into three main sections: Sunrise Locations, Sunset Locations and Alternative Locations. Immediately I want to ask, ‘What about midday locations?’ But much of the year photographing Arches in the middle of the day ranges from not much fun to downright miserable and even fatal due to the heat. As another outdoorsman I know said, “In that country in July you cannot carry enough water.”

Within the three main headings, each location gets a treatment. Each geographical area is laid out on one page with a short description; a section called, “Getting There,” essentially the trail directions; a “Need to Know” note that gives safety cautions, background, history, tips on how to tread lightly, or get more enjoyment out of each photo spot; and most importantly for our purposes, “Photo Advice.” Here Edge’s enthusiasm for the landscape shows, as does his acumen for open-ended suggestions that allow for more diverse possibilities rather than guiding everyone to make images like Bret Edge.

This format is not only clear and concise, but it saves time over wading through the many other guidebooks and pamphlets on Arches National Park. As might be expected in a guide devoted solely to one national park, Edge covers all of the locations found in the more broadly focused book, The Photographer’s Guide to Canyon Country: Where to Find Perfect Shots and How to Take Them by John Annerino, but Edge also adds quite a few more photo spots and goes into more depth on each. In Edge’s guide the type, though small, is in a clear, readable font. Division into the various headings and subsections as described above make Edge’s guide quicker to read and easier to find essential information inside than many guides arranged in standard text formats.

Moon Handbooks are known for quality and depth, but the Moon Handbook for Arches and Canyonlands National Parks, covers no more trails and destinations than Bret Edge’s NatureScapes eBook packs into only 30 pages. Besides, the Moon Handbook, of course contains minimal information specific to photography. A guide by Wilderness Press called 50 Best Short Hikes in Utah’s National Parks by Ron Adkison offers a rich narrative on Arches National Park including archeology, flora, fauna, park ranger interpretive activities and more, but the limited photographs in black and white do not evoke as much of what can be experienced visually. Travelers and explorers may read many books on the history and background of Southeastern Utah, but for photographers, Bret Edge lays it out best in his short easy to follow format. Only Photographing the Southwest: A Guide to the Natural Landmarks of Southern Utah & Southwest Colorado by Laurent Martres covers more photographic ground than The Essential Guide to Photographing Arches. However, Edge does offer a few spots and details about spots that Martres misses in his comprehensive photographer’s guide. Also, Edge’s Photo Advice is more specialized to fit local conditions and customized for photographing sandstone formations, reflecting the experience of Edge as a desert inhabitant and photography workshop leader in the area.

The only change I would make to the Essential Guide to Photographing Arches is to add information on photographing the national park in the winter or during the middle of the day when the season or weather allows. Nonetheless, if you want a book that gives you much solid information in a tight, focused and well-presented arrangement, Edge’s power photography guide is the NatureScapes eBook for you. Order here directly from NatureScapes’ order page.

Arrival In Vernal, Departure For Dinosaur

Even with sporadic rain and spring virgas dotting the horizon, the high open mountain passes of Rocky Mountain National Park, shining with stark beauty, already felt dry like the deserts of the interior and Western side of Colorado. Coming from the drizzle of a wet summer on the Colorado Front Range in Boulder, the high desert plains north and west of Steamboat Springs were warm and welcoming with the smell of sage and sun cracked earth all the way to Vernal, Utah.

After arriving indestructible at Randy Fullbright’s house at 4:00 am, I followed his previous instructions for where to catch a few hours of sleep. After waiting as long as he could, Randy woke me up somewhere between 7:00 and 8:00 am, and I found I was no longer indestructible. Indeed, with the night’s caffeine worn off, I was bone tired. Not only did I have very little sleep that night, I had just spent two weeks with minimal sleep moving all of my belongings. Weariness finally caught up with me here, in Vernal, the very morning I was supposed to rise to the occasion for a long hike in Dinosaur National Monument.

Well, I couldn’t exactly drive all that way, show up on Mr. Fullbright’s doorstep and then try to explain why I was too tired to go, especially with excitement in the air and him already well into his coffee that was making him increasingly indestructible by the minute, not that he wasn’t tough as nails even in his sleep. Everything I began to say about being tired sounded like a feeble excuse on the way out. So, I abandoned that line for the time being. Somewhere in the back of my mind, I must have reasoned that there might be opportunities for complaining later, but fortunately that would prove not to be the case.

Just then it was all about gathering my hiking boots, socks, camera gear, day pack and other items for our outing that seemed determined to rock on whether my body was ready or not. Randy and I had been talking on the phone about exploring Dinosaur for weeks, if not months, and the day had arrived. It was overcast so far. We wrestled our gear into Randy’s Ford 4×4 pickup, made lunches, reshuffled my cooler and other food into a cool place in the house and jumped in the truck ready to rumble.

The Approach: Diamond Mountain Road

Dinosaur lies east of Vernal. You can take the road to the Dinosaur Quarry on the Utah side before you get back into Colorado, or take Highway 40 across the Colorado border, turning left on the Harper’s Corner Road near the park headquarters and Colorado side visitor’s center, or enter the national monument on dirt roads that cross the prairie ranch lands just east of Vernal. We took Diamond Mountain Road. It jarred us around here and there with a few rough spots, but generally was smooth graded gravel that turned to pothole-riddled pavement in the national monument. Diamond Mountain Road meandered through dry washes and over low mesas that melted together as one open mesa top and faded into the mist in the distance. The sun nearly broke through in a few places, but mainly the clouds kept the sage-dotted sparsely grass-covered earth draped in mystery.

This land stage is battleground not only to the interests of Dinosaur National Monument, wealthy ranchers, developers, speculators and miners in a new energy boom. It is a battleground for idealists wishing to grow wealthy as Vernal develops as a mecca for fracking and other dirty mining approaches. Some special interests believe the only obstacle to Vernal’s rise to economic stardom and wealth would be Dinosaur becoming a national park and thereby imposing higher air quality standards on the area, limiting industrialization. Tourism interests and others on the other side of the issue believe the opposite. They argue that it is exactly Dinosaur’s conversion to national park status that would bring more new prosperity to the region than any other short-lived or even long-lived mineral or oil and gas extraction boom.

Randy and I had discussed many of these issues in the weeks and months leading up to my arrival in the area. Randy had also told me stories about photographing many of the remote and little known parts of Dinosaur, some that my father, pioneer wilderness photographer Philip Hyde had also photographed in 1951-1955, many that he had not. Randy spoke of places like Island Park, Echo Park, The Chairs, Jones Hole, Harper’s Corner, Mantle’s Ranch, Old Roundtop, Split Mountain, Whirlpool Canyon, Gates of Ladore, Hell’s Canyon, Yampa Bench, Rainbow Park, Douglas Mountain, Blue Mountain, Cub Creek, Deer Lodge Park and many others in the canyons of the Yampa and Green Rivers. For more on remote places to photograph see the blog series beginning with, “The Battle Over Dinosaur: Birth Of Modern Environmentalism 1.”

Many Ranchers And Other Groups Are Against Dinosaur Becoming A National Park

“Many of the ranchers, who also happen to be old friends of mine, are against Dinosaur becoming a national park,” Fullbright said. “They are afraid that they will lose their rights to grazing on the national monument if it becomes a national park.” This has happened over time in several national parks of the west. In Canyonlands, for example, grazing rights and leases were written to run out after 100 years. Randy said that in contrast the National Park Service in Dinosaur would be willing to offer grazing rights in perpetuity. “It wouldn’t be that hard for the National Park Service to give each of the old ranching families a grandfather clause for running livestock as long as their blood lines last, but they don’t trust that.”

Later, after I returned home to Northeastern California, Randy suggested I contact Dan Johnson, Dinosaur’s Chief Interpretive Ranger, to hear more about the potential for a change in Dinosaur’s park status. More on the issues involved in the next blog post in this series…

As we crossed the high plateaus approaching the canyons of the Green River, the signs of grazing were apparent and an occasional lonely fence angled off into the distance to join others. The mood of austerity was accentuated by washed out skies, white mists and lands colored by a limited palette of grays and beiges. Even in these drab conditions, the desolate wind-swept near-raw land had a presence and nature that only brought joy rather than loneliness to the heart of long-time desert travelers and dwellers like Randy Fullbright and me. The ceiling began to lift as we drove. By the time we came up over a hill and could look down on the fish hatchery and see ahead the impressive 10-15 mile long escarpment of Diamond Mountain. The skies remained gray overhead, but we could see as far as the land allowed in every direction.

I made a few photographs before we plunged down toward Diamond Gulch on the road that began to wind sharply with the contours of the hillsides. We stopped once again before a longer stop for more photographs where the road turned to parallel Diamond Mountain. At that spot, the views up at the eroded sculpting of the strata of Diamond Mountain in subtle reds, oranges, tans and beiges, were well worth photographing.

Randy drove us on down just a little ways to the Fish Hatchery, where we parked, talked to the park ranger for a while, then hoisted day packs and set off down the fishing trail into Jones Hole along Jones Creek. More on the story of our hike, some of it’s highlights and surprises, conservation photography, spiritual experiences in nature and more in the next blog post.

This Land Is Our Land

Philip Hyde and the American Wilderness

Show Extended through March 18, 2014

Due to popular demand, we have extended the Philip Hyde show another two weeks, until March 18. We look forward to seeing you in the gallery.

Philip Hyde (1921-2006) dedicated his life to photographing and defending the western American wilderness, working with the National Audubon Society, Wilderness Society, Sierra Club, and other environmental organizations during a career that lasted more than 60 years. After studying at the California School of Fine Arts, now the San Francisco Arts Institute, under Ansel Adams, Minor White and Edward Weston, Hyde went on to make of some of America’s most respected landscape photographs, many of which were key elements in campaigns to protect the Grand Canyon, Point Reyes, California coastal redwoods, North Cascades National Park, and other sensitive lands.

Original Proposed Article Title: Minor White, Philip Hyde and His Schoolmates on The Art Of Seeing

My four page feature article in this month’s print issue of Outdoor Photographer magazine, delineating how to more effectively harness the creative mind, bond with the natural world and make more sensitive imagery, has stirred up significant buzz and even a touch of controversy. See the examples below. For more on my writing background see, “About David Leland Hyde.”

A very big thank you to all those who have commented on Twitter, sent me e-mail and otherwise showed signs of enjoying the article. Here is some of the feedback, including some by today’s who’s who in nature and landscape photography:

Indeed a wonderful article. Deep and inspirational. I am so glad that Outdoor Photographer published it, most of all for them, since articles like these raise publications of photography to another level. Well done. – Rafael Rojas

I really enjoyed this article – if only all photography writing was as good. – Tim Parkin

In my own photography journey I noticed an incredible improvement in both my images, and my happiness, when I started doing my twilight photography. Those images required me to commit to a single composition for the entire evening, and as a result I spent a lot more time looking, observing, and fine-tuning. I got into that “zone.” Eventually I started taking that approach more for many of my images. Slowing down like that is harder in the digital world, but David makes a very compelling case for it, and hopefully it will inspire some photographers to try it out. — Floris van Breugel

In this current world of quick, fast and overly saturated photography, David shows us how to slow down and “smell the roses” to make meaningful images through the historical approaches of masters like his father, Minor White and Ansel Adams. – Joseph Kayne

Great article. I would like to see more of these photography-as-art pieces. – Chuck Kimmerle

One of the best articles that Outdoor Photographer has run in a long time. Like Floris and Chuck, I too would rather read articles that educate and inspire like David’s rather than another “Best Winter Hotspots” or “DOF De-Mystified.” The qualities that made Galen Rowell’s OP columns so interesting to read back in the day are the same qualities found in David’s article. I think it’s fine to have sensationalist headlines on the cover to sell magazines but inside the magazine should be filled with substantive content. – Richard Wong

A superb article touching on many important points. I’d love to see more like it in print. – Guy Tal

It was a great article (mandatory reading)… Hopefully David’s article will set the magazine on a more educational path. (Ten Secrets/Ten Top Spots has run its course.) Good stuff. – Michael Gordon

Really great article David. Congratulations. It makes me want to go out and take photographs – to feel that ‘in the moment’ feeling. And your Dad’s photograph of “White Domes, Valley of Fire” is just especially sublime. The kind of photograph I can contemplate for a very long time. – Eric Fredine

Excellent! Very refreshing to see an article about being in the moment, instead of “getting the shot.” — Lori Kincaid

Must read. Wonderful Piece. If you haven’t already you should read this article by David Leland Hyde. — Rob Tiley

Great article on mindfulness when making photos. I found myself slowing down just from the rhythm of the words. — Nancy E. Presser

REALLY great piece! Terrific history lesson, too. — Robin Black

One of the best articles in Outdoor Photographer magazine in a while. — QT Luong

Loved hearing about David’s experiences with his father in this month’s isssue of Outdoor Photographer. — Russ Bishop

Great Read! David’sopening photo, of tall grasses lit by the sun next to a stream, is exquisite. The kind of image that instantly brings peace to the viewer. — Bret Edge

I haven’t subscribed to Outdoor Photographer for many years and more articles like this would make it more tempting to read more often. For the past year I have been trying to slow down and not force the issue, letting the images reveal themselves rather than actively hunting. Freeman Patterson’s Photography and the Art of Seeing was the first photography book I ever bought and it may be time to pull it off of the shelf for another reading. Thanks for the reminder. – David Chauvin

Fantastic read! Congratulations!! Hope you and Outdoor Photographer do more of these types of articles. – Colleen Miniuk-Sperry

About time there’s more than just the latest equipment review and how it will make you like Ansel Adams. If someone wants to create a great photograph, the process begins with clarity of vision and ends with well-crafted execution of the image. The equipment is just the tools of the trade and worthless without the vision and craft. Edward Weston didn’t have great equipment, but brought to fruition through great vision and exquisite craft. Ansel had the best equipment and a great vision. Philip Hyde likewise. Many of today’s “photographers” have the best equipment and tools the world has yet imagined. However most lack a clear vision and many of those are clueless as to the craft. Instead, they rely upon the crutch of technology and gimmicks contained in their iPhones and plug-ins on their editing software. Still others offer excuses for their lack of vision and craft and reliance upon funky effects. No matter how eloquently you explain the image, “I worked so hard…” underneath it all, a polished turd smells the same. Your article is a good start to get the ball rolling to a higher plane. Keep it going… — Larry Angier

What a refreshing article! First I have to say how happy I am to see such a wonderful piece of writing. It is long overdue. David Leland Hyde gives us a glimpse into the true meaning of the photographic vision. Learning how to see, not just with our eyes and camera, but with our soul. Getting in tune with the environment we’re in while out in the field, taking our time, and planning. In this day and time we see so much about gear and equipment, and so little about photographic substance. I hope that there will be more articles like this in the future. — Rachel Cohen

Absolutely loved the piece in Outdoor Photographer. It’s rare to see something of useful value in the rags these days. Great insight into the minds of very gifted photographers. You gave some very good information on creativity, lacking in most magazines recently. — Ed Cooley

Excellent article! I think David hit a rich vein of subject matter both personally and for the photography community. The ideas in the article need to be shared and become a bigger part of the discussion in photography (and life in general). The pixel peepers, the camera companies, the low hanging fruit photo tours, etc, have all hogged the mike for too long. Sing it out brother David! It will be interesting to see the reaction you get from the article. The quiet approach and the process of slowing down the feverish mental activity scare many. There’s no hiding from the truth in such a state. It’s a lot easier to be go go go because then there’s no time for the big questions. I enjoyed reading about White’s blank mind and the receptive place of readiness in the creation of a photograph. The very first book on photography I read was Freeman Patterson’s Photography and the Art of Seeing. I pull it off the bookshelf and read it every so often because I need to be reminded of one of the first ideas Patterson shares in the book – letting go of self is an essential precondition of real seeing. I’m not a big fan of pre-planning images because I feel too much organization and control results in self as an obstruction in the creative process. It’s my experience that my images which are too pre-conceived, while they may achieve a good technical level, lack soul. I don’t achieve a feeling of transcendence in their creation and viewers don’t respond in a very strong emotional way either. I totally agree with Stan Zrnich – “the process is about getting out of my own way and quieting the ego.” Too much desire to control maybe doesn’t result so much in the Art of Seeing as the Art of Ego. – Peter Carroll

Please write me in the Contact Form above, by e-mail or comment here and let me know your reactions, ideas, critiques or any other response you have to the article…